


Narcissus

by luminousbeings



Series: You Don't Have To 'Verse [3]
Category: Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)
Genre: Kodos POV, M/M, Purposefully skewed morality, Tarsus IV, Themes of dubious consent, dark themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-27
Updated: 2016-03-27
Packaged: 2018-05-29 10:11:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6370732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/luminousbeings/pseuds/luminousbeings
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Like all beautiful things, James is a spoiled, ungrateful creature. These are traits Kodos will have to purge from him when the time is right. For his own professional development.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Narcissus

**Author's Note:**

> This will probably make you deeply uncomfortable. Please read the trigger warnings!

The new student has his feet up on the desk.

It is a show of dominance, a testing of Kodos’s limits, whether the boy knows it consciously or not, and it takes the governor all of one glance to know that he is looking at a natural leader.

There’s the classical leader’s confidence bordering on insolence, of course, as well as the attractiveness—yes, he can appreciate that, it’s not a crime to look. But more than that it is the way he has commanded the attention of the other children in the class, and it is only his first day. He has emerged as implicit spokesperson for the group merely by virtue of his _existing_ in it.

Kodos had been expecting some form of resistance like this when he’d accepted George Kirk’s older son into his advanced political science class two years before, and had been surprised when Samuel Kirk turned out to be an intelligent and well-mannered young man, unaffected by the celebrity inexplicably bestowed upon his father and even more inexplicably bestowed upon himself by extension. Due to the small number of students in the Tarsus IV colony school, the children were separated by skill, not age, and Samuel Kirk certainly earned his place in the highest track of classes, including Kodos’s own. The disappointment was that the seventeen-year-old was already too far along in his own development, too “locked in” to his own, emotionally-driven approach, to be effectively molded by Kodos’s direction.

 _This_ boy on the other hand…

This boy, the one watching him with bright, clever eyes, relaxed and smirking and unconsciously riveting every gaze in the room, has been through six schools in four years, according to his academic record. He is adept at the power struggle of the classroom. He is accustomed to testing his boundaries, to wresting control only to throw it away once he has it, just to prove the teacher incompetent.

He is not accustomed to Kodos.

“Today we will begin to read Julius Caesar,” he tells the class, ignoring the Kirk boy’s behavior for now. “In order to use Shakespeare’s insights to analyze political process today. Please open your books to—yes?” He nods at the boy’s raised hand.

“I don’t want to learn Julius Caesar,” he informs the class, his gaze unswerving and his voice matter-of-fact.

The children giggle nervously.

“Unfortunately,” says Kodos, “the curriculum is not up for public debate. Open your books…”

The boy’s hand is up again. The governor ignores it.

“Why is it not up for public debate?” he asks, when it’s clear he won’t be called upon. “Is it because you’re afraid you’ll lose?”

“Jimmy,” Samuel hisses from his own seat two rows over. “ _Shut up_.”

Kodos takes a long breath. “Mr. Kirk, if you do not think yourself capable of sitting quietly…”

“Oh, I think myself capable. That’s why I’m here, because I think I can do it. Why aren’t you willing to tell us why you can teach?”

“Mr. Kirk…”

“Why should we listen to you? Just ‘cause you’re at the front of the room? ‘Cause nobody’s bothered to question you yet?”

“Mr. Kirk, this is your _last warning_ —”

“What’s the governor of the planet doing teaching kids anyway? Do _you_ even know?”

Kodos’s hands tighten into fists. “You,” he says tightly, “are an immature, destructive child…”

“Destructive?” the boy repeats, as though personally offended. “Destructive…. You know, that’s what’s wrong with all you teachers. You assume destructiveness must be a _bad_ thing. Is it not true that before building of the positive can begin, one must destroy the existing negative? Is that not how algebra works, sir? Is that not how physics works?”

“ _Jimmy_ ,” Samuel groans, burying his face in his hands.

He ignores his brother and actually climbs on top of the desk. The class is staring at him, riveted.

“Is that not the entirety of Socrates’s philosophical modus operandi? All he did was tell people where they were wrong—essentially destroying the negative so that the positive could have an opportunity to take root. Why, then, are destructive forces always condemned? Tell me that, sir, and then maybe I’ll let you teach us Julius Caesar.”

“It is not up to you,” Kodos grates out, “to allow me to teach you. If you are unequipped—”

 _“It must be by his death,”_ the Kirk boy declares, cutting him off, _“and for my part_

_I know no personal cause to spurn at him_

_But for the general. He would be crowned._

_How that might change his nature, there’s the question._

_It is the bright day that brings forth the adder_

_And that craves wary walking. Crown him that,_

_And then I grant we put a sting in him_

_That at his will he may do danger with._

_Th' abuse of greatness is when it disjoins_

_Remorse from power. And, to speak truth of Caesar,_

_I have not known when his affections swayed_

_More than his reason. But ’tis a common proof_

_That lowliness is young ambition’s ladder,_

_Whereto the climber upward turns his face._

_But when he once attains the upmost round,_

_He then unto the ladder turns his back,_

_Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees_

_By which he did ascend. So Caesar may._

_Then, lest he may, prevent. And since the quarrel_

_Will bear no color for the thing he is,_

_Fashion it thus: that what he is, augmented,_

_Would run to these and these extremities._

_And therefore think him as a serpent’s egg—_

_Which, hatched, would as his kind grow mischievous—_

_And kill him in the shell_.”

Kodos stares back, utterly speechless.

“Brutus himself made the decision to kill Caesar—to kill his own adopted father!—not in order to destroy, but to create. To give his country the best chance to succeed. Because what has never been understood by teachers like you, sir, from Esau to Brutus to Socrates—is that destruction is a kind of creation.”

And Kodos stares, stares at this boy standing on the desk, reciting Shakespeare, referencing philosophy, theology, formulating concepts the average adult cannot fully fathom, the sun setting his hair ablaze, his eyes burning, bewitching, his smirk expectant, waiting for Kodos to react, to get angry at him, to punish him. Waiting for Kodos to be like all his other teachers, who’ve seen this—this…whatever it is—and haven’t known what to do with him.

And Kodos…continues staring.

Seeing.

Recognizing.

Recognizing _himself_. Here. In this boy. This fire with no direction, no control…

“How old are you?” he asks.

The boy tilts his head, surprised but not derailed. Curious. “Fourteen.”

 _Fourteen._ “And you…memorized that soliloquy yourself? You composed that…speech…yourself?”

“Sure I did,” he replies cheekily. "I'm so articulate, it's disgusting."

“It’s extraordinary,” says Kodos, and the boy stops.

Stares at him, taken aback. As if he has been physically shocked.

It is as if the boy has he never been before been called extraordinary. Which could not possibly be true.

Could it?

Could it be that this boy, this carbon copy of George Kirk, has not been unduly lauded because of his father but unduly ignored? Could it that because of the high expectations upon him, he has never been called extraordinary? Because if he excels, he is only living up to those expectations.

(No wonder he has chosen instead to fail. If only to bypass those expectations altogether.)

Could it be that this boy—this reservoir of untapped, undefined ability—is being seen for what he is for the first time?

The thought is…electrifying. “What is your name?”

The boy pauses. “JT.”

“I asked for your _name_ ,” says Kodos. “Your full name.”

“James Tiberius,” he replies, rather reluctantly.

Interesting. He does not include his last name, although he must suspect it could give him deferential treatment. It is as though he _wants_ to separate himself from his father; as though he knows his own strengths, his own credits, and wants to be judged on them, not someone else’s. Yet another similarity between them.

Kodos smiles. “A strong name for a strong personality. James, then.”

He can see the boy open his mouth, on the verge of protest, and continues, “I’m sure you can understand that nicknames are for children. And you…” He looks the boy up and down, evaluating him. Understanding him. Extending the courtesy of _seeing_ him, for all the beauty he is—heart, mind, and body. “You are not a child.”

James beams back at him as though he has never been so proud in his entire life.

“I want to hear what you have to say,” Kodos tells him. “I want to hear everything you have to say. From your seat.”

James sits down in his seat.

He never interrupts class again.

 _If this is what he is at fourteen,_ Kodos thinks as he begins to teach, keeping one eye ever on his new project—his new protege, _all haphazard charisma and raw, embryonic power, wearing hand-me-down jeans and a rock band t-shirt, what will he be at eighteen? At twenty-five?_

The only ingredient missing is something—someone—that can focus that immeasurable power in the right direction. That can mold it into the proper form.

Kodos recognizes himself in the boy. There are some differences, of course; but those can be easily corrected.

\---

As time goes on, Kodos’s project becomes all the more promising. James begins to settle in to his new home on Tarsus IV, begins to make friends and become comfortable with his aunt and uncle. His behavior in class is perfect, and the work he turns in…

It is insightful and informed and well-considered. His ideas are sound and his thought processes dynamic. James comes to class prepared and puts his best work into every assignment.

It is clear that the boy is seeking his approval.

If Kodos needed proof that his attentions are not one-sided, he has gotten it.

When he arranges the private lessons with James, it is a demonstration of his belief in the boy’s potential. In James’s ability to be molded.

And it is much easier to teach him to be molded when there are no other influences distracting him.

\---

The day following the arrangement, Samuel stays late after class.

“Sir,” he says. “I wanted to talk to you about Jimmy’s private lessons.”

Kodos raises an eyebrow. “You disapprove?”

“Oh - no, I definitely approve. He _is_ too smart for the rest of the class, and I think it’s really important for him to have something like this. I just…” The nineteen-year-old blows out a breath, looking aside. “I just wanted to make sure _you_ knew how important it is for him.”

“Important in the sense of…?”

“He trusts you,” says Samuel bluntly. “He sees you as the father figure he never had. I mean, we have our stepdad, I guess, but…”

He makes a vague gesture to imply that their stepfather was not much of a parental figure.

“Jimmy likes to seem like he doesn’t need anybody, but he does. _Especially_ a father. So. Please take care of him.”

Kodos will take care of him, of course. But he can’t help but scoff at Samuel’s theory that James’s infatuation is the desire for a father figure.

How wrong he is.

\---

And so the private lessons begin, and twice a week James comes to Kodos’s office to learn a variety of subjects, from literature to science to philosophy. And every day James’s crush becomes more obvious.

That glance at him, after all, was clearly of a lustful nature. And there, when their hands brushed as James reached for the book on his desk, that could have been avoided. And the way he smiles when he is complimented…

What else could that possibly be but sexual attraction?

It is so obvious it is exasperating. Infuriating.

But still, he cannot be the one to initiate; he will have to wait until James makes the first move.

\---

James has the habit of chewing on his pencil when he takes tests.

He is doing it now, in Kodos’s office, poring over the essay question (it is a particularly complicated one, requiring the connection of concepts from several literary sources and the application of those to both historical and contemporary politics) as he absentmindedly taps the tip of the pencil against his lips, and nibbles it, and lightly sucks it, and—

And it is extremely…distracting.

Kodos grits his teeth, tries to looks elsewhere, but his gaze is always drawn back. It is maddening. It is _obscene_.

There is no way James is not doing it on purpose.

“James,” he says eventually, when the boy starts writing, but unfortunately keeps sticking the pencil in his mouth between sentences. “This is a written test. You are not being graded on your oral abilities.”

James looks up at him, confused. “I know.”

And the fifteen-year-old goes back to his test and Kodos closes his eyes and wills himself to be calm. To be patient.

He imagines what those clever lips could do if they were only given proper instruction. He imagines what that hair would feel like between his fingers.

 _James is being deliberately obtuse,_ he tells himself. _He is simply doing what he has always done, and testing my boundaries. But he will not drive me to frustration. I have more discipline than he does—I can wait._

\---

Not even after he explicitly teaches James one of life’s most valuable lessons—the inexorable truth of economics—does James ask what he owes Kodos. Not because doesn’t understand the principle, nor because he doesn’t see how could be applied…but because he doesn’t see that he owes Kodos anything at all for everything he’s done for him, for all the time and effort he’s sacrificed in the interests of James’s evolution. The boy feels entitled to the special treatment he’s been given.

Like all beautiful things, James is a spoiled, ungrateful creature.

These are traits Kodos will have to purge from him when the time is right. For his own professional development.

\---

One thing that can never be said about him is that he doesn’t care for his people. He cares for them enough to do what he can, for the people he can save. Even as the mold overruns the colony crops and Federation assistance still does not arrive.

But even after he’s cleared out the medical bay and the elderly and the rest of the parasites who would only hasten their deaths, there are still approximately 250 that must die.

There are 253 students in the Tarsus colony school.

\---

It is much easier, and much quieter, to teach when there are only three students left.

However, this is not entirely true—there may be only three students left in his classroom, but there are at least several more somewhere else. Stealing food and causing mayhem and calling themselves the Children’s Rebellion and setting off every nerve in Kodos’s body.

They cannot have access to the storage house without access to one of the “lucky ones.”

The question is which of them that is.

He continues to teach about the history and eventual destruction of the Alderaanian government, and the Riley girl watches him. Meets his eye unflinchingly.

It is her, Kodos knows. She is the traitor.

But he can’t kill her without proof.

\---

James kisses him.

He kisses him like a man dying of thirst, finally finding water. He kisses him passionately, desperately.

 _Finally,_ Kodos thinks.

“I—I’m sorry, sir,” James stammers afterward. He licks his bruised lips and something growls in Kodos’s chest. This is _his_ now, and every moment of waiting is finally worthwhile. “I don’t know what came over me, I just—”

He can’t repress the smirk that spreads across his face. The boy has held out for so long; it simply wouldn’t be right to deny him what he wants any longer. He pulls James close. “I knew it.”

Those blue eyes widen. “Wh-what?”

“You’ve wanted this since you’ve laid eyes on me, have you, James?” Finally he can run his fingers through that blonde hair, as he’s wanted to for over a year. It’s just as soft as he imagined it. “You’ve been leading me on since the beginning. Always such a little tease.”

Slowly, James nods, and the governor rewards him with another kiss, slower this time, allowing more time to push him against the wall at his leisure and explore. His neck, his chest, his stomach… James makes a needy noise as he begins to work on the boy’s pants, and Kodos laughs.

“Sir…” his voice sounds strangled. “I don’t – I’m not –”

He wouldn’t have expected James to be so shy. That comes with inexperience, of course. But once he has some practice, Kodos is certain that he’ll excel in this as he does in everything else. He just needs some…encouragement.

“Now, James,” he says indulgently. “To back out at this point would be exceptionally bad form. After all this time, after all the hard work I put into teaching you, keeping you fed and looked after. Ignoring your – ah – ‘rats.’”

The boy stares at him, and the governor knows he has hit upon an excellent encouragement. He’d suspected that James held some manner of affection for the so-called Children’s Rebellion—perhaps his brother is involved as well. That certainly would fit with his hypothesis that he and the Riley girl are romantically involved.

“You think I don’t know what they’re doing?” he continues. “You think I couldn’t find them soon enough if I so wished? Heaven knows why you waste your sympathies on that pathetic lot – between the two of us, James, you really should know better. I am willing to humor you, of course…but everything comes at a price.”

James seems to understand. Good. A lesson well-taught, then.

“So you see, after everything I’ve done for you, don’t you agree it’s about time I received some form of reimbursement? Answer me, James.”

“Yes,” says James. “But –” 

“I could, of course, seek recompense from your brother instead,” he muses. “But I can tell you really do want this, despite your halfhearted objections. Don’t you, my sweet little tease? Answer, James.”

“Yes,” says James, even quieter this time. Almost a whisper.

Kodos gives the boy a rare, affectionate smile and and strokes his cheek. “You were always one of my quickest learners. You owe this to me, James. You understand that, don’t you? Answer.” 

He doesn’t answer, and Kodos pulls his hair, causing the dual benefits of arresting James’s attention and eliciting a whimper of pain that goes straight to the governor’s groin.

“You don’t have to say yes, James,” he tells him. “You just have to not say no.”

As always, the boy is a very fast learner.

\---

James is absolutely insatiable, it turns out, and Kodos indulges him daily, sometimes more (he remembers what it’s like, being fifteen). Their arrangement is beneficial to both of them: James keeps his little rebellion safe and Kodos gets a well-needed release from the stress of administrative life, and they both enjoy the exchange of services.

The opportunity to shape James, to “break him in” as it were, in this manner as well, is glorious. Here, too, the boy progresses beautifully, understands what is required of him by pure intuition, and does it without complaint.

That is one of his lessons that has taken root most securely, in fact—the virtues of staying quiet. James doesn’t say a word, no matter how long he keeps him wanting or how hard he brings down the whip. He hardly makes a sound unless it is called for.

Of course, most of the time Kodos keeps him gagged. Gagged and bound and helpless (there is something truly magnificent about all that potential, helpless, at his feet), unable to say no if he wanted to.

Not that he would want to.

\---

James has the habit of looking elsewhere while Kodos is inside him.

If it were just looking elsewhere it would be one thing; but it is almost as if the boy _is_ elsewhere, as if his mind is a million miles away, lost in nothing, his gaze focused on nothing.

It is insulting.

It is unacceptable.

It is Kodos’s job to teach him discipline, and discipline is learning that everything has its time and place. Here and now, he should be grateful for what Kodos is giving him.

“Look at me, James.”

There is no answer. It is as if James is not in his body at all.

“James. I said _look at me_.”

Recognition flickers. Blue eyes dulled with something (pleasure, most likely) meet his. Good.

Discipline. Pain tolerance. The ability to make difficult decisions. This is what he is teaching him, these are the lessons necessary for James’s for personal and professional development.

“I do hope you appreciate this,” he groans. “My indulging you. Always doing it the way you want. The way you suggest. Though I must say I do enjoy your ideas…”

He’s close now, the heat engulfing him, pushing him faster, harder, making James breathe in a gasp of pain with each thrust.

“Isn’t it nice to be seen for the beautiful—brilliant— _slut_ that you are?”

He comes a moment later, and it doesn’t really bother him that James never answers yes to the question.

(He doesn’t say no, either.)

\---

Over time, James becomes quieter and quieter in class, outside class. He doesn’t speak as often, and when he does, his words are brief and well-chosen, all his brilliance compressed, focused, sharpened like the blade of a knife. Finally that fire is controlled. Contained. Finally it can be molded, shaped… Finally Kodos’s vision for him, for all the greatness he is destined to be, can be made real.

“See me after class,” Kodos tells him, and James looks up, his eyes dark with that powerful, dangerous understanding.

Understanding that Kodos has given him.

James will never be able to repay him for what he has given him, of course, but their arrangement is a start.

\---

It is an indication of his affection for the boy that when his guards inform him that they have finally located and arrested the Children’s Rebellion, he actually hesitates before ordering them to be brought in front of him to receive their punishment.

He has indulged James long enough, after all.

He has to care for his colony as well.

\---

It is quite straightforward for most of the children—he must make an example of them, and the simplest way to do that is to tie them up on the platform in the city square and kill them slowly.

The only problem is that whipping James makes him hard. Makes him want more.

James has not looked at him, has not acknowledged him, since Samuel’s unfortunate death.

He hits him harder than the others, humiliates him further than the others, pays special attention to him—as he always has—more than the others.

And still, no response.

Even burning off half of his friend’s face does not elicit a response.

And still, Erika watches him silently. Assesses him. Judges him.

It is past time, Kodos decides, that she was taught her place.

\---

When the smoke clears after the civil war and it becomes clear that there is nothing else to save, it grips his heart in a panic unlike any he’s ever felt.

He leaves the children tied to the platform, knowing they will likely starve—then again, they would have starved without him. He is not doing any harm.

James still will not respond.

It is not his body they find in the ashes of the capitol building but the body of one of guards, dressed in Kodos’s clothing. He was killed in the civil war, of course—it isn’t like Kodos killed him.

He’s not a murderer, after all.

\---

It is with a new face and a new life that Kodos confronts the way the reporters, the historians construe him.

Kodos the Executioner, they call him. As if all he wanted was death and destruction. As if he hadn’t been trying all along only to save who he could.

Well. Let them say what they want. He knows that he is innocent. He had had no idea that Starfleet would arrive the day after the civil war. He couldn’t have known that. He could only do what he could do, with the information he had at the time.

Like Oedipus, there is no point in plucking out his eyes and wandering blind from Thebes for a sin he did not intend to commit.

_Kodos the Executioner._

What nonsense. That’s all it is.

Superstition and nonsense.

\---

Surprisingly it is not the loss of his public image that he finds almost unbearable to reconcile, but the realization that the traitor had been James all along.

He must have known it somewhere. He must have suspected. He just…had never allowed himself to admit it, had only put the pieces together (so obvious in retrospect; so, so painfully obvious) when he had some distance.

Distance didn’t stop the burn of betrayal.

Nor did it stop the ever-present itch of fear.

James survived, he knows. James is out there, somewhere, brilliant and angry and dangerous. Kodos’s own creation, his own Frankenstein’s monster, only partially completed, malformed, out of control.

James is the only one who could recognize him. Who could identify him.

Who could kill him.

He sees James in nightmares, laughing cruelly, pulling him into a kiss and then pushing him away, mocking him.

James staring at him. Understanding him. Accusing him. “You disgust me,” he whispers. “I never wanted you. I was only using you for my own ends. Pedophile. Rapist. Murderer.”)

“No!” Kodos pleads. “I didn’t know. I didn’t _know_!”

\---

He adopts Lenore as a symbol of his new life, because nurturing has always been a part of his character.

And if he can simultaneously refute James’s accusations (“Pedophile. Rapist. Murderer”) in his mind, well. All the better.

\---

He is a fantastic father. 

He raises her with everything she would ever need - he cares for her, he guides her, he teaches her. He reads her the classics as bedtime stories and she quickly grows into her own understanding, into her own sort of brilliance.

It is nothing compared to James's, but still.

He is a fantastic father. And every hug he gives her, every smile, every time he does not touch her in a way unbefitting of a father towards a daughter, is a point disproving James's accusations.

But still the nightmares persist. Still those eyes follow him. Haunt him. 

“I didn’t know!” he begs the ghost in his nightmares. “I didn’t _know_! I did the best I could. What more would you have me do?”

The ghost looks back at him with bright blue eyes and a terrifyingly blank expression. “I would have you pluck out your eyes and wander blind away from Thebes.”

\---

He is not surprised in the slightest when he sees the pictures in the holofeeds. Captain James T. Kirk. Youngest captain in Starfleet history. Savior of Earth. Hero of the Federation.

If he was a good-looking boy, Kodos notes, he has become a breathtaking man. The physical development only makes him wonder how his mind has changed since Kodos's lessons on Tarsus. He still had so much to teach him, so much more to do to him. For him.

Still, despite the lessons left unfinished, it is because of _him_  that James was able to fulfill his potential. He owes this - everything he’s become - to Kodos. The _universe_ owes everything he has become - and by extension, its very existence - Kodos. Even if they will not acknowledge it.

Even if James will not acknowledge it.

\---

He sees blue eyes watching him. Accusing him. He sees them in the glint of the spotlight on Planet Q, as he pleads with the ghost of Banquo, insists that it wasn’t his fault; that he cannot be blamed.

 _“Avaunt, and quit my sight!”_ he shouts. “ _Let the earth hide thee._

_Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold._

_Thou hast no speculation in those eyes_

_Which thou dost glare with!”_

_“Think of this, good peers,_ ” he hears Lenore say, as Lady Macbeth. Her voice seems so far away. Like another lifetime. “ _But as a thing of custom._

_'Tis no other; only it spoils the pleasure of the time.”_

_“What man dare, I dare,”_ Kodos mutters.

_Approach thou like the rugged Russian bear,_

_The armed rhinoceros, or th' Hyrcan tiger;_

_Take any shape but that, and my firm nerves_

_Shall never tremble. Or be alive again,_

_And dare me to the desert with thy sword._

_If trembling I inhabit then, protest me_

_The baby of a girl. Hence, horrible shadow!_

_Unreal mockery, hence!”_

This is foolishness, he knows. He repeats. Over and over again he repeats: this is foolishness. The same foolishness as Oedipus the King. He didn’t know. He didn’t _know_. He did the best he could with the information and nonsense. James doesn’t know he’s alive, and even if he did, he would understand that. His fears are completely unfounded.

Superstition and nonsense, that’s all it is.

Superstition and nonsense.


End file.
